Not long ago I noted that, contrary to the post-trial statements of Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood and Neshoba County District Attorney Mark Duncan, there is proof James Chaney was tortured, and there is evidence he was shot by more than one person. At the time of the original state autopsies, the families of James Chaney and Michael Schwerner requested additional, independent autopsies, which were conducted by Dr. David Spain of Scarsdale, NY:
"We made the request because the state had been so hostile to us and was engaged in a campaign of denying the murders," said Schwerner's widow, Rita Bender of Seattle. "That we were right is exemplified by the fact that the state of Mississippi issued a death certificate for Michael Schwerner, which was sent to me some weeks after the Featherstone autopsies, which stated that Mickey's cause of death was 'unknown.' "
After Spain concluded that James Chaney's body was "totally decimated" by those who tortured him, William Featherstone, the medical examiner who conducted the original state autopsies, teamed up with the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission to bring ethics charges against Spain to the College of American Pathologists.
When Spain was quoted in the media about his conclusions, Featherstone angrily contacted the commission, saying Spain never contacted him and that a second autopsy can't be performed without permission from the pathologist who made the original examination.
Another reason for that anger was that Spain's statements "conflict sharply with the official autopsy," commission documents show.
Featherstone obtained the commission's help in filing an ethics complaint against Spain with the College of American Pathologists. "The complaint has also been filed with the executive director of the college," commission documents show. "The matter is scheduled for hearing at the annual meeting of the College of American Pathologists at Miami, Florida, October 16, 1964."
During their post-conviction question and answer period Duncan and Hood "said that they knew much more about the case, including who actually killed the three, than they were allowed to tell jurors in court."
Duncan said Wayne Roberts and James Jordan, both of Meridian, were actually responsible for shooting the young men, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner. Roberts shot Goodman and Schwerner, he said, and Jordan shot Chaney, they said.
The autopsy photograph and signed autopsy reports, obtained by the Clarion Ledger in 2000, prove that James Chaney was tortured. Sovereignty Commission files say that James Chaney
was shot at several times by several different people but was struck by only three bullets, each of which was alleged to have been fired from a different firearm."
James Hood and Mark Duncan do not state that James Chaney was beaten. The Attorney General and the District Attorney claim there were only two gunmen, one who shot Schwerner and Goodman and one who shot Chaney.
In his closing arguments for the prosecution of Edgar Ray Killen, Jim Hood bragged:
I wanted to be here myself, I didn't want to have any regrets. That I did my duty to the victims and their families.
Which side are you on, boys, which side are you on?
Which side are you on, boys, which side are you on?
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Read Dr. David Spain's account of his Mississippi Autopsy.
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So now, what?
After Philadelphia, the collective unconscious closed their notebooks and left Mississippi for the next newsworthy battlegrounds. One hoped that Mississippi’s citizenry would wake up and put enormous pressure on the state’s attorney general to go after everyone else who killed Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman. But so far, it is not happening. The Mississippi culture would never allow it. Besides, “as long as we look better than we did before Killen was convicted, why start this mess all over again?” some were saying.
Last January 7, 2005 New York Times reporter Robert McFadden wrote on the upcoming Killen trial – “The most infamous unresolved case from America’s civil rights struggle four decades ago.” McFadden wrote that “After a frantic chase, [Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman] were caught and taken to an isolated spot on Rock Cut Road, where they were killed:
“Mr. Schwerner on Mr. Bowers’s orders, and Mr. Chaney and Mr. Goodman because they were witnesses…Mr. Chaney was beaten to death, while Mr. Schwerner and Mr. Goodman were each shot once in the chest.”
McFadden seemed to be working through the question that many keep asking: “Why only Killen?” The NYT reporter asked this of one law enforcement officer and was told
“We went ahead and got him [Killen] because he was high profile and we knew where he was.” In other words, they went after Killen “because he was there.” So why not keep it up and go after the others now that Killen has been taken care of?
McFadden continued: “Mississippi has reopened some [other] old civil rights murder cases. In 1994, Byron de la Beckwith was convicted of the 1963 assassination of Medgar Evers, a field secretary for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.”
This is true. Prosecutor Bobby DeLaughter did a good job. And in his book that he wrote about the Beckwith case, DeLaughter confirmed that others were involved in Medgar Evers death. (Something the black community already knew). But he brought no charges against anyone else. I write about this in Where Rebels Roost, Mississippi Civil Rights Revisited.
Hockman never testified – DeLaughter won without him, and knew that Hockman might present problems. So once again, the easiest route was taken and the more complicated issues ignored.. But as far as DeLaughter and others would say, they “got” their man. Case closed.
McFadden had more to write last January: “Efforts to bring about a trial for the murder of civil rights workers in Mississippi have been enhanced in recent years by the opening of the long-secret files of the State Sovereignty Commission, which was founded in 1956 to defend the state from “encroachment” by federal authorities.
“Before it was abolished in 1977, the commission monitored anyone suspected of promoting racial integration. Containing 87,000 names, the files detail a series of Klan killings in the 1960’s, including those of Mr. Evers and Mr. Dahmer, as well as those of Mr. Schwerner, Mr. Chaney and Mr. Goodman.”
Now we all know that a whole lot of those papers are missing. It was decided to take a few truckloads (what was left) out of the Commission’s offices and post them on the Internet. And this was good. But what about all of the missing Sovereignty Commission papers? Who has them? Who threw them away? Has anyone even tried to look for these papers? Would this be too hard to do? Wouldn’t there be more information in these missing files to help solve old murders? Wouldn’t it have been the “worst” files that were pitched or hidden?
Erle Johnston, the most powerful Sovereignty Commission director, in his autobiography admitted to taking some of the papers home, and making sure they would never see the light of day? Has his house been searched? Any relatives still living? Kids with big garages?
A few cop cars out to the homes [estates] of John Satterfield, Senator “Slippery Jim” Eastland, and some of the others, including the Commission’s agents, would be a good start. And really not too hard to do. As for Killen, the easy part is over. Now it’s time to get down and dirty. The best could be yet to come.